UK looking through unsafe criminal convictions done by interns
The Guardian reports findings obtained from an internal Criminal Cases Review Commission board paper revealing details of the review process of rape or murder cases before 2016.
As the exoneration, who had been wrongly convicted of rape, triggered a major criminal cases review, The Guardian revealed that the job of surveying potential wrongful convictions for rape and murder was being assigned to interns.
Last month, the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), the body responsible for looking into the miscarriage of justice, announced that it would be re-looking into cases it had refused to refer to the court of appeal to check for new DNA testing opportunities.
So far, it appears that interns are the ones conducting this case review exercise as they have started the process of weeding out historic cases that could potentially be sent for further DNA testing, an internal CCRC board paper seen by The Guardian has revealed.
This board paper, labeled "official sensitive" and partly redacted, was carried out by the casework operations director on March 8 and sent to Malkinson's legal team after a freedom of information request.
Why is this concerning?
Wrongful convictions that could have been possibly missed by the CCRC could be revealed through this exercise, which is what prompted Malkinson's solicitor at the law charity Appeal, Emily Bolton, to say, "Given the seriousness of this review, it is concerning that so far the work has been done mainly by interns."
The CCRC has also restricted the scope of this exercise to rape and murder convictions which implies, according to the paper obtained by The Guardian, that around 8,000 other serious potential miscarriages of justice cases would be left out.
According to the document, the CCRC is not going to consult forensic scientists any time before the final phase of the exercise. By that phase, the CCRC case workers would have already decided on whether forensic work could affect the case or not.
The Malkinson case
Malkinson, who was exonerated last year following a fresh forensic test of a sample of the victim's clothing related to male DNA on the police database, remained in prison for 17 years due to a rape case in 2003 that had no DNA linking him to the crime.
Even though five years following his conviction, the CCRC was informed of a forensic review discovering a searchable male DNA profile on the victim's vest top, it refused to request further DNA testing and rejected his case in 2012.
This is what prompted his legal team to set out a deeper forensic exam themselves, in turn leading to the new discovery in his case.
A deeper look into the review
Looking into rape or murder cases before 2016, the first phase of the review will have an intern examine more than 5,000 cases of such convictions that have been refused referral to the appeal court to determine which cases qualify with the main issue being the identity of the attacker.
The second phase will entail an in-house investigation to identify the cases where further DNA might be needed "based on the material available in our system" and will be carried out by investigators themselves.
Phase three will then include possible collaboration with forensic scientists who could further test the DNA.
Interns have weeded out 912 potentially eligible cases down to 270 so far.